y. Silvio was big for an Italian; big and
brawny; as his smile faded his face assumed a look of stubborn
determination.

"So you want the gold now, Silvio?"

"At once, if it please the Signore. The gendarmes are ugly if the law
is broken. Their jails are not as pleasant as the grape-house. So the
gold must be twice the amount we had spoken of, Signore."

"And you will promise she shall not escape; that you'll keep her safe
until--until I tell you to let her go?"

"That is our bargain, Signore."

Jones sighed regretfully.

"Very well, then, Silvio," he said. "You're a robber--the son of a
brigand--the spawn of a bandit! But come with me to the house, and you
shall have your gold."

* * * * * * * *

Alora stayed all that week with Mary Louise, hearing nothing of her
father and almost forgetting her unhappiness in the society of her
delightful new friend. It was Sunday evening when the Colonel and Mary
Louise drove their guest over to the villa and the two parties did not
see one another again until they met on the deck of the steamer in
Naples on the following Tuesday morning.

The Joneses came aboard very quietly just at the last moment and at the
gang-plank Alora's father was confronted by a grimy Italian boy who
handed him a letter. Without pausing to read it, Jones hurried below,
and he kept his stateroom until the ship was well out in the blue
Mediterranean, on its way to Gibraltar and New York. But no one missed
him, for Alora and Mary Louise were happy at being reunited and Gran'pa
Jim was happy in seeing them happy.

CHAPTER XIII
DORFIELD

In one of the middle-west states there is a delightful little city
called Dorfield. It hasn't so many thousand inhabitants, but in all its
aspects and its municipal equipment it is indeed a modern city. It has
factories and a big farming community to support its streets of neat
and progressive shops, and at the west side of the business district is
a residence section where broad, wooded streets furnish the setting for
many cozy homes. Some of the houses are old and picturesque, and some
are new and imposing, but each has its flower-lit garden, its fruit and
shade trees and its little garage or barn tucked away in the back yard.

When you come to Oak Street there is a rambling frame house on the
corner, set well back, where Peter Conant, the lawyer, lives with his
good wife and his niece Irene Macfarlane, who is seventeen. This is one
of the ancient dwellings